I'm just trying to figure out how to avoid scorching my lme again!
Add it to warm (160F to 200F) water.
For my 2.5 gal recipes where I used LME, I added all the LME at around 180F before the start of the 30 boil. I didn't have to stir "fast and furious" to avoid scorching. I also warmed the plasic pouch in warm (120F-ish) water for about 20 minutes.
If I were doing late additions, I would either take wort out of the boil kettle to dissolve the LME or heat some additional water to 200F then dissolve the LME into the kettle.
Late additions of DME/LME appears to reduce the color of the wort by around 1 SRM. Personally, I don't worry about 1 SRM when my beers are already above 6 SRM.
When lowest possible color matters, I use BIAB.
If you are looking for the lowest possible color, use DME and check out
this post (link). It confirms many of the things you'll find searching the "extract" forum (and you can avoid the relentless trash-talking of DME/LME that often occurred here in the later 2010s).
LME can age rapidly (due to heat and oxygen). There's a technique that is described in either "Advanced Extract Brewing" or "I brewed a favorite recipe tody" that discusses how to measure the quality of the LME. I've used it, it works (e.g. If your extra light LME is red, that's "not a good ign").
Yeah, standard extract kit instructions almost guarantee at least some scorching of the LME.
FWIW, most online stores provide additional instructional videos
Can we pleae stop throwing all kits "under the bus"?